The Quirks Of Being Lilyflower
by Zeeah
Summary: Where a certain James Potter tries to start a conversation with his wife-to-be and faces the wet and slightly squelchy circumstances. Pure, pure fluff. And laughs. Beta Credits: the lovely Rukmini- merci beaucoup, hubby! the equally lovely and efficient Deirde- words can't express my thanks, Dee! Dedicated to the best frenemie ever. Gryffie, you're the most adorable git I ever met


**Disclaimer: *insert witty disclaimer here*  
**

**A/N- No, seriously, I'm just a hopeless fangirl stuffing her face with chocolate. I'm sure JK Rowling has got better things to do. Okay, so this fic stars a slightly OTT James, so if you're looking for a serious, angsty one, sorry. However, if you're looking for a dorky, hilarious one and some crazy Jily fluff, I promise, you shall not be disappointed.**

**Oh, and I'd advise you not to consume eatables and/or drinkables during the fic-reading process if you're the snorty types. Your screen shall not fare well. **

** The Quirks Of Being Lilyflower**

Ah. That insane bird and her quirks. Oh, her quirkiest quirk, you ask? Merlin's humongous bushy mustache, the girl's got so many that it's bloody impossible to keep track. Yes, even for Evans-obsessed, love struck, stalk-er, admirers like yours truly. Ahem.

Did you know she stores, nah, _hoards_ treacle tart up in her dorm like a bloody Bowtruckle? To be gorged upon during times of dire need, aka whenever she has one of her usual run-ins with yours truly, again. That's right, she eats it even after it goes all stale and stinky. Eurgh. And I do have proof, I'll have you know. I was unfortunate enough to catch a whiff of the stale, treacley stench wafting off her the other day when she was napping on the Common Room couch after a particularly grueling Transfig OWL. No, I was most certainly not sniffing her like some common mutt. That's Padfoot's territory, didn't you know? I just so happened to be in the vicinity. Hey, it's my Common Room, too, you know! Judging Jacks. Pfft.

Speaking of. Not jacks, or mutts. I mean OWLs. Brings me to Evans' madness. Topped all her usual levels of perplexing abnormality. Yes, I know, hard to believe.

Anyway.

So one fine post-Charms OWL morning, I, James Potter, was heading towards the good ol' Beech Tree next to the Lake for a spot of quick revision before the afternoon's practical. Not that I needed any, of course. It was a particularly lovely morning; all fluffy marshmallow clouds, Ravenclaw-blue skies, cool, tantalizing winds drifting up from the lake(courtesy- the Giant Squid, or as we like to call him, Posquidon. He does enjoy swishing around, disturbing the ocean currents, bless his little noggin'); yknow, the famous Hogwarts-esque beauty, in all its magical glory. Sigh. My own splendid poetic mind amazes me sometimes.

So guess what my Lily-deprived, starving, myopic eyes stumbled upon? No, don't. I'll be glad to enlighten you.

A certain fiery redhead, that's what. No, not Gideon Prewett. It was Her Royal Madness, Evans, of course. An Evans with a disturbingly weird look on her pretty face, knobbly knees pulled up tight to her, ahem, chest, wild crimson curls even more Bowtruckle nest-ish than usual. Ah, the perfect Snitch on the already marvelous cake of Hogwartian beauty. Quite the poet, aren't I?

Now, where Evans is, Potter follows. Even a puny first year learns that within his first week here. Elementary, really. However, where a slightly demented Evans is, a slightly reluctant Potter follows. Thus, it was with a rather healthy amount of trepidation (trust me, you do not want to be on the non-Evans end of Evans's wand), a hand steady on his wand, and a hesitant gait, that Potter approached the lovely object of his affections. My, third person makes one feel right royal doesn't it? Said he, in his husky, masculine voice.

I reached her in a couple of seconds, and kneeled down next to her. She was staring off into the distance, seemingly lost in Lilyland, or wherever she frolics about in that mental little brain of hers. Probably fantasizing about the Giant Squid. That woman stealing whore. Gah.

I waited impatiently for a couple of minutes(felt more like an hour and 3/4ths) for her to notice me. When it was clear that she'd be exploring the intricacies of Lilyland unless I pulled her out pronto, I snapped my fingers in front of her face.

"Hello? Earth to Evans?"

She jerked out of her reverie, blinked slowly, and turned towards me.

_Ah, there you are Mr. Scowl. Oh you've come too, Mr. and Mrs. Scrunchy Lips. How utterly spiffing to _

_see you!  
_

"What do you want, Potter?" came her dulcet tone.

_Hi there, Ms. Eyeroll. I've missed you, you know.  
_

"Why, I must say I'm gravely hurt, Evans. You can practically hear my fragile heart breaking. Can't a bloke drop in to say hello to his lovely classmate, housemate and treemate?

"I'm really not in the mood for your ridiculous childish antics now, Potter. In fact, I'm so far from it at the moment, that it's practically an irritating dot on the far, far horizon. Aand, it's gone.

_How nice of you to give an appearance too, Dr. Dry Wit. It's always splendid to see you. _

"Aw, cmon Evans. I'm not kidding. What's up? Is something wrong?"

"Oh, no, of _course_ not," she said in a mocking voice. "Everything is absolutely fine and bloody dandy. In fact, didn't you know, it's my very new hobby to discuss the semantics of Ancient Runes with this highly intellectual tree here every morning. It's my new buddy, Beechy, you see."  
With that, she patted the gnarled tree trunk behind her, an oddly wild look in her eyes.

_Oh hello, Sir Sarcasm. And your charming companion,_ _Senor Stark-raving-bonkers. You do complete this little jamboree._

"I'm serious, Evans. No, don't _smirk_, that pun's older than Dumbledore. Will you sodding enlighten me, please? What's wrong? I'm genuinely concerned."

Smooth, James. The perfect mix of concern and maturity.

And Evans, oh Evans. She just looked at me. With those enormous, freshly-pickled-toad eyes. Imploring. Shining with some unknown sentiment. Knowing her, and knowing me, most probably contempt. Or maybe she'd just got something stuck in her eye. Eyes.

Holy Godric, she was pretty. Like wet–your-pants-and-hide-'em-in-Sirius's-drawer pretty. I could just feel that darned flush creeping onto my, er, cheeks, when out of the magenta, without any bloody warning, she burst into tears. Uh huh. _Tears_.

Now, let me ask you a question. One of immense importance; a life or death one, actually.  
Have you ever seen the girl of your craziest dreams cry?

Yeah, you'd expect it to be all soft, delicate sobs; tiny adorable sniffles; musical little sniffs; dainty nose-blows, and so on, wouldn't you? Well. If that _is _ the case, then you ought to thank your freakishly lucky stars, comets, and every single God you believe or don't believe in. Do it. _Now_. No, I mean it. Do. It. Now. Because. You know what the other variety is?

Wild, horn blower sobs. Nose blows so horrendously loud, you'd think all of Durmstrang would come running already. Flailing, borderline scary arms, which hit you right in the nose and leave it tomato-red for a _week_. Snot, mucous, phlegm flying willy-nilly, simply drenching you with their gory goodness. In a depressing, and frankly bloody terrifying nutshell, _not _a pretty picture.

_But_. And this is a big but. And don't even try laughing, you immature infants. The weirdest, and most worrying part of this whole debacle, was, you know what? She had _never_ looked more beautiful to me before than she did then. Yes, owl Mungo's, alert the Mental Ward, keep a bed ready under the mighty name of Potter, blah blah, spare me the dragon dung.

Seriously, as I looked her; red, bawling face, swollen cherry lips, tear-soaked strands of hair clinging to her cheeks, all I could think was, "Would she cry harder if I kissed her right here and now?" I know. I am fully aware. I had, and have lost it. Absobloodylutely, Room-of-Requirement-ishly lost it.

But then, Evans does tend to have that effect on me.

Anyway, so I put a tentative hand on her back, having ruled out the smashing-lips option, in a rare moment of sanity. If anything, she only started crying harder.

Darn.

I tried another approach.

"Hey, Evans? Did I tell you about the time Sirius and I got into a spat about the many intricacies of Exploding Snap, and the pair of us ended up with half an eyebrow each, bright pink teeth, clad only in novelty Gryffindor boxers? Ah, no, Sirius had indigo ones. Teeth, that is. We strongly suspect Remus, that sneaky evil genius of a wolf."

That elicited a sniffy giggle from the sobbing bundle of red and black that was my fair lady. A sniggle, if you please. That's got quite a ring to it, doesn't it?

Greatly encouraged, I ploughed on.

"Oh, and did you happen to know about Sirius's greatest fear? The one which wakes the poor sod up every Friday night and makes him quietly creep into my bed? _Clowns_. And ducks. Uh huh. Sirius sodding Black, is secretly petrified of innocent clowns, and birds of the yellow, quacking variety. Godric's goulashes, that time when Peter and me popped a clown nose onto that rubber duckie's beak, charmed it to quack at deafening decibels, packed it into a box and gifted it to Sirius on his 13th? I bet the resultant shriek woke you all up, didn't it? Quite the shrieker, our Sirius is, bless his little(although going by Hogwarts legend, quite large actually) tongue. And Sirius swears on his hair he wasn't scared. That pathetic wimp. Pssht.

Another sniggle. And a hiccup, too, this time. Ah, a sniccup.

"Ah, Evans. Are you quite aware of the fact that I used to _detest_ redheads? Before I met you, that goes without saying. With every pore of my handsome being, actually. An incident involving a five year old James with an arsonist aspiration, a mad old Scandinavian red-head nanny, and a pair of pincers. Do _not_ even ask."

Now, that got a full blown snort. Aand, I decided right then that there was nothing on Earth more delightful than an Evans snort. Attawizard, James. She finally lifted her head from where she'd stuffed it down her knees all that time.

Her face resembled apple pie. Really, that's the most suitable resemblance I can offer. A rather pretty apple pie, of course. With two large green avocados, and- Alright, not the best metaphor, sorry.

She looked at me. The right, (no wait, was that her left) corner of her lips tugged up into the most glorious little half-smile, I've had the please of laying my eyes upon. Hallelujah! Glory be to Merlin and his bananas! The lady smiled! An actual, honest-to-God, 12-muscle smile. Waheey.

I really ought to make a living out of this lark.

"Jokes and Jests-a la James" Bloody brilliant, if you ask me. Also, I have the ability to alliterate astoundingly.

Hah.

"Ah, there's Mademoiselle Smile, she's the one I've been waiting for, ever since I could change my own nappies."

Mademoiselle Smile graciously gave way to the woman behind my very own heart, Lady Laugh.

"Quite the jester, aren't we, Potter?" she asked in a wobbly voice. See? All you faithless, disbelieving skeptics out there, in your face! We have a _bond_. Yes, we most certainly do. Also, duh.

"Duh. What did you take me for, huh, Evans?" I said in my perfected mock-hurt tone.

"To be quite perfectly honest, definitely not what you've shown yourself to be today, James."  
Er, what?

"Er, what?"

"Ah, nevermind." She had this thoughtful little smile on her face, front teeth nibbling at her lower lip, and seemed to be completely lost in some deep, Merlin-only-knows-what thought.

"Oi, Evaaans. Mind telling me what it was that set you off on that charming spray-James-with-snot fest back there, to put it in a mild manner? Not that I mind, of course. Much."

The smile abruptly slipped off her face, to be replaced with a frown.  
Darn it to the Potions dungeons. Stick to the rules, Potter. The _rules_.

"Oh, I suppose it wouldn't hurt to tell you, now that you've witnessed, and, er, have been drenched, by one of the famous Evans freakout sessions."

"Mhm?"

She looked me straight in the eye.

"I royally screwed up the Charms paper. I- I, really messed up."

She looked so downcast that I wanted nothing more than to hug the bloody intestines out of her, if not for the ever-present fear of getting soaked again. Honestly, the girl looked like her cat had just been brutally murdered by a rampaging axe murderer. Not that Butterbeer would've been harmed by something as trivial as that. Probably would've axed the murderer himself, that feline devil.

"Ah, come on now. It can't have been that bad, Evans. I mean, you're our resident Charms swot, aren't you? Rumor has it, you and ol' Flitters get together Thursdays to discuss the latest experimental charms." I said, with a feeble attempt at humor.

Another snort. Aha. Well, I fully expected her to have probably skipped a couple of questions or perhaps left out the last section on Cheering Charms, the time was rather short, actually.

"I…I…" She swallowed hard, looking like a bloody bezoar had gotten stuck in her throat.

I had my most Concerned Face on, complete with furrowed brow and scrunched up nose. Merlin, I hope I hadn't put on my Constipated Face again. I do get muddled up between the two.

"I spelled the Leviosa pronunciation as 'Levi-o-_saaa_ instead of 'Levi-_ooh_-sa'." With that startling revelation, she buried her face in her hands again.

"Even a puny first year couldn't have bogged that up, Potter. I am _so_ bloody stupid. And Charm's is supposed to be my best sodding subject! I practically sleep with the textbook, for Merlin's sake. Just when I thought I was actually quite good at it, I go and fuck it all up. Flitwick's going to think I'm no better than a mere midget of a first year, now. It was a bloody levitating charm, James! Wingardium Leviosa! Merlin, I should just ask the Squid out, while I'm ahead." came her muffled voice.

And _that_, dear readers, that's when I exploded.

You know, after all the laughing I did, I'm surprised my arse is still in place and functioning well.

Because Evans, oh, Evans, that little ninny, had actually been crying like she'd just heard Voldemort was out to get her, because of a _sodding spelling_.

Take that.

Seriously.

All those tears shed, all that snot, all that nose punching, all that banshee wailing, all for a measly spelling? Hey, that rhymed. Really, Evans? _Really_?

"Er, Potter? You alright there? You look…er…"

Oh, I'd been ranting in my head then.

Geez.

So then, I said the only thing any sane bloke could.

"You. Are. Bloody. Mad. Evans. Excuse me."

And I got the hell out of there.

A marvelous display of "Run, Potter, Run. The stampeding Hippogriffs are behind you!"

Because the girl was fucking insane!

It was a spelling.

A _spelling_, darnit.

Once more, for luck,

A. S.P.E.L.L.I.N.G.

So there you are, then.

Evans' quirkiest quirk.

Her bordering on oh-god-just-back-off-slowly obsession with obtaining utter, and utmost perfection in _every-sodding-thing_ on the face of this beautiful, albeit insane planet.

Merlin, don't I just have to like the odd ones. Gah.

**A/N- I think it's safe to say this now. This was my first attempt at a Jily one-shot and reviews would mean the world and James Potter to me. Ah well, James Potter is my world, heh. Concrit would be immensely appreciated as well.**

**And psst. James will drop by in your dreams if you review. If that's not incentive, I don't know what is.**

Merci! Keep laughing, keep fangirling.

~Z


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